


Sign Your Name

by Perpetual Motion (perpetfic)



Category: Law & Order: SVU
Genre: Alternate Universe - Soulmates, M/M, Soulmates
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-02-21
Updated: 2018-02-21
Packaged: 2019-03-21 23:18:02
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 515
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13751286
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/perpetfic/pseuds/Perpetual%20Motion
Summary: To find your soulmate, you sign your name. Reactions may vary.





	Sign Your Name

**Author's Note:**

  * For [tobeconspicuous](https://archiveofourown.org/users/tobeconspicuous/gifts).



> From a fic prompt a while ago. First time I've done a Soulmates AU. It was fun!

When Sonny is ten, Gina comes home screaming and flailing. She’d signed her name on a group project, she sobs to their mother. And Matthew Hubbard had signed his while she happened to watch, and she’d felt it. She’d  _felt_ it. And it was cold and uncomfortable, like a sudden sharp breeze.

“He’s so gross, Ma!” She screeches. “He never washes his hair, and he has pimples, and his fingernails are always dirty.”

“Shhh,” Ma says, rocking Gina back and forth. “Shhhh. Teenage boys are gross. It’s okay. We’ll take it one day at a time. It’s fine. If you don’t like him, you don’t like him. It’s not the end of the world. It’s the universe making a suggestion, not a demand.”

Sonny forgets the memory over time unless someone brings up another instance of melodramatic soul-bonding. He grows up. He becomes a cop. He finds a real sense of belonging in SVU. He falls hard for Barba and asks him out after months of pining.

“You can’t be serious,” Barba says, and it’s nowhere near the worst rejection Sonny had expected.

“Completely serious,” Sonny replies. Barba looks skeptical, not disgusted. “You. Me. A couple of pork chops the size of our heads.”

Barba grins, just barely. “Shouldn’t it be steaks?”

“For a first date? No way. These pork chops are stuffed. Two kinds of cheese and prosciutto.”

“Of course you found a way to slip something Italian in there.”

Before Sonny can make an absolutely  _terrible_ leering joke, Barba hands him a pen and points to the document they’ve been reviewing. Sonny leans over and signs. He hands the pen back and watches as Barba signs, ready to point out Barba still hasn’t said no.

Sonny shivers, then twitches, and then his whole body is infused with warmth, from his toes to the ends of his hair. He opens his mouth to ask Barba if the heat kicked on, but Barba’s staring at him with the same open-mouthed look.

When Bella had come home after the first time she and Tommy signed their names to something (the same group project Gina had done, it so happened), she was over the moon, describing the feeling in detail until Gina cried and stomped away–She and Matthew had never been able to create more than a tentative friendship, which Gina didn’t really care about unless she could use it for drama.

Sonny’d forgotten all about that, too. Until now. Standing here and staring at Barba, who–of course–manages to find his voice first.

“I’d accuse you of planning this, but you’re nowhere near smooth enough to pull it off.”

Sonny laughs and feels like he’s glowing. “So, dinner then?”

Barba considers him for a moment, then steps into his space, pulling Sonny down with a soft tug at his tie. The kiss tastes like licking a 9-volt battery, and Sonny swears the hair on his arms stands up.

“Sure,” Barba says.

Sonny kisses him once more, gets another lick of that 9-volt, and can’t believe his luck. This one, he knows, he’ll never forget.


End file.
